Craigslist Bike Sale = Busted!

[Fly Rod]

A good friend recently called me to ask if I knew where his bike was. I had tuned it for him recently so he thought I may have it. Nope. It was stolen from his property probably within the last two weeks. I offered to watch craigslist for him because he was soon to be out of town for a while.

I checked it a couple of times last week and no love. Thursday the last thing I did before going to bed was to check Craigslist again. There it was, just listed that day. I read the add and checked out the photos. Yup, his bar ends, saddle, bottle cages, computer, pedals all there. I called him and had him check it out to be sure it was his. Sure enough it was. He called a friend who was a local detective and told him about it.

His friend went in Friday am and confiscated the bike and the info on the person who had pawned it. Sad thing is that it was a trusted employee who had stolen and pawned it.

The good news is he has his bike back and the answer to who had stolen all of his other equipment, to the tune of $10k! Unfortunately, the other goods were long gone.

Be careful of who you are buying from. Pawn shops, Craigslist and Ebay have replaced the "fence" of old days.

 

[VFRMAN]

Great news! Nice to hear for a change.

I had a Giant Trance 2 taken out of my garage a few years ago. Never spent that much on a bike in my life so it was my baby.

I did the same thing. Called all over thinking I had to have just left it with someone to work on after a ride. No way in Hell could it have been stolen right out of my locked garage. Sure enough.

Never did find it but used my homeowners insurance to replace it, then used American Express to cover my deductible. Got lucky, but I fully expect to see some jackass riding it around one day on the street.

"Sorry officer, I don't know what happened. My truck just swerved to the right somehow. It was unavoidable."

 

[96r50]

IH8THIEVES

My brother had his snowboard stolen from the local hill a few years ago. The next day he made up a poster with a photo, all the specs (including the serial number), and his contact info on it. He went around to all the local ski/snowboard and used equipment shops in town, talked to the techs and asked them to put the poster up inside the shop where only they could see it.

Less than a month later he got a call from one of the shops saying that they had his board. Some kid had obviously ridden it a bit, got tired of it and tried to sell it. The tech behind the counter recognized the board and took it back into the shop to "check it out". He compared it to the poster and realized it was my brother's board so he went back to the front and told the kid he would take it, but he would need the his name, address etc for the paperwork. Once he had that he asked the kid where he got the board and a bunch of other pointed questions. The kid figured out that the jig was up and bolted out of the shop.

My brother was pretty stoked to get his board back intact. It was pretty tempting to pay a visit to the kid's house, but we figured that might not end well.

 

[KayakPanic]

+10 for Bad@$$ ski and board techs!!!

 

[StevenS]

Love a story with a good ending. My house was hit early last week - an attempted break in. Luckily the alarm went off and scared them away. These kids (assumption here) were brave though - they pulled their vehicle into our back yard to load up! Thank God for the alarm. Use it every day now. They could have had everything I owned, including the vehicles, the bikes, the electronic goodies, all of it. Of course while all that stuff is replaceable and insured, the most heartbreaking part of it would have been losing the pets. In their hurry they left the gate wide open, and had they been in the house I'm sure the critters would have gone outside to investigate and would be long gone (or worse).

Thanks for posting these stories. Everybody use your alarm! I've also heard that a lot of folks are starting to install tracking systems on their goodies. Have they invented anything undetectable for the bicycle yet?

 

[haryv]

pretty funny ive had things stolen before. Saylavee. never to see my items again. I say put a cell/gps stick on it. problem solved if stolen again.